Truly, you don’t know what you got ‘til it’s gone.

We’ve been making jokes about Barbie Forteza and Jak Roberto for the last seven years, pointing out that GMA probably has a story about them on hand whenever it’s a slow news day, or about Jak Roberto being based AF, this couple was background noise that we just assumed would keep going indefinitely.

Until it didn’t.

2025 has just begun, and already, we’re devastated. Let’s talk about why this unexpected breakup is similarly having unexpected effects on all of us right now.

8. We all thought they were stronger than this.

From the Anti-Silos Jak Roberto University to BarDa being welcomed with boundaries clearly drawn behind the scenes (or so it seemed), we really thought that BarJak was endgame. It shocks us to no end to discover otherwise.

7. Does true love even exist after this?

It’s so hard to believe it does when BarJak is no more. There were some couples that we assumed would stand the test of time. They were one of those couples.

6. We really took them for granted, huh?

We were joking about them, yet now, we’re crying over them. It only proves that we really took them for granted. It was such wholesome fare that they were peddling, one that didn’t even milk them for money seeing how they were rarely ever paired together on television or films to begin with. Considering how cynical we all are in 2025, they were, unironically, a bright spot in all of that gloom and doom.

5. It puts into question all these fortune tellers who made predictions of any sort for 2025.

Are you going to believe anything Hanz Cua says now after he screwed up predicting a prosperous year for 2020 while missing the most significant thing that happened in that year, and not seeing the end of BarJak coming in 2025? This puts into question all those star signs, if none of these so-called psychics could even predict this.

4. What does GMA write about now on a slow day?

BarDa? Oh, please. Don’t get us started on that, because as far as we’re concerned, BarDa is non-canon. Non-canon, I tell you!

3. What do you mean #RelationshipGoals?

What goals are we talking about here? Sticking together for all of seven years only to unceremoniously end with a whimper? No thanks. We’re forever done with #RelationshipGoals from this point on.

2. And speaking of hashtags…

Whether you called the #BarJak or #JakBie or even #JaBar,  it’s truly the end of an era. BarJak was all of us. Whether you were in a couple and longed to be as wholesome and sweet and brilliant with exchange gifts, or single and vicariously lived through their antics, they represented the best that love had to offer. Now, it’s dead – just like the hashtag itself.

1. The after-breakup rumors are wild.

You know what people always assume after a high-profile celebrity breakup, right? There must have been a third party! Either way, the rumors are pretty wild.

On the one hand, us accepting BarDa as reality seems pretty mid at best, considering how David Licauco is the most underwhelming actor to ever underwhelm since Joseph Bitangcol (Remember him? No? EXACTLY.).

On the other hand, there is a rumor going around that Jak Roberto found love in the arms of one Olivia Rodrigo. We can’t even begin to imagine what to call THAT couple. We just can’t.

How are you dealing with the #BarJak breakup?